It was a good hour or so before we mustered enough energy to overcome the inertia that was prompting us to sit on our butts at the hostel itself. After all, it was quite a nice environment at the hostel itself. But, today was going to be a long day.
A bit of good news first; we could now comfortably take the L-train, and hence didn't have to walk all the way down to Little Puerto Rico just to take the subway. Finding the station was a little tricky - it was kind of hidden by bushes; almost as easy to miss as the Leaky Cauldron.
But once in the subway system, the trip downtown was simple. The train went under the East River, rather than over it. And, as I mentioned yesterday, you can actually feel the sharp drop in altitude when that happens.
The whole itinerary was ripped from a wiki-answer response to a question posed by a user; so the first stop was actually Walls Street. Later we realised that perhaps the answer given was not the best one, because we ended up backtracking quite a fair bit during this tour of South Manhattan.
What is in South Manhattan? Well, Walls Street, for one, as mentioned above. The World Trade Center used to be here prior to 911, so now its the site of Ground Zero (which I wanted to visit, though Pammie had no interest for it). The Statue of Liberty - well its not really on Manhattan, but the ferry to go there is. And the Brooklyn Bridge too, which connects Manhattan to Brooklyn.
We started at Walls Street - at Trinity Church, to be specific. If anyone has watched National Treasure, they'd know that there's treasure buried under this church, under Parkington Lane in the crypt of the Church. My enthusiasm for visiting such a site was not shared by Pammie. Not entirely unexpected, though, I should add.
I watch too much TV.
From Trinity Church we saw a sign pointing us a few blocks northwest towards the WTC memorial site. So, I managed to convince Pammie to come along to see the memorial site. But Pammie soon lost interest and was distracted by PayLess, a shoe shop along the way there. So we split for awhile while she goes shopping and I go to see the memorial site.
To be honest, I heard of the memorial site more from the spoof news network Onion News Network rather than from legitimate news.
Then we backtracked towards Trinity Church and Walls Street, which is just outside Trinity Church actually ("Heere at the Walls" - another quote from National Treasure). But I must mention, Walls Street took me a little by surprise. For one, I had never anticipated that it was a pedestrian street. But it is.
Walls Street, in case you didn't know, is the location of the NYSE (New York Stock Exchange), where I think lots and lots of money flows through every day. History has proven time and again that when this place crashes, the world tends to go down like dominoes. But that's business and that's boring. What's interesting is what is flying OUTSIDE Walls Street.
Mind you, that is NOT a result of photoshop.
Yes, I was wondering the same question as you - What on earth is the Singapore Flag doing flying outside Walls Street? I mean, I think there's a good chance that I could ask most of the passers-by what flag that is and not many would actually know.
Should I have done that? Mm.
Anyway, walking down Walls Street, we get to the riverside; but not before passing by some delicious smelling Briyani Rice street-vendor. Definitely worth a visit soon. But first, to the Staten Island Ferry.
Now, there's nothing really at Staten Island itself worth mentioning. What's awesome about it, however, is that its connected to New York by ferry. The ferry, interestingly, is FREE. Better yet, the ferry ride offers great views of the Statue of Liberty.
On board the ferry, I think most of the people were actually only there for the view, rather than actually intending to get to Staten Island. And all these people, together with us, of course, got off the ferry at Staten Island and quickly reboarded the next one headed back to New York.
Interestingly enough, if you look at the map, you'd realise that Staten Island, as well as Liberty Island in fact, are actually closer to New Jersey than New York. In fact, the waters surrounding the two islands actually belong to New Jersey. As yet, I'm not too sure how different the laws are in these two states; but I'm quite sure that state policies and laws do differ from state to state.
After getting back to New York, we were famished; and that Briyani Rice was definitely calling to us. So we obliged.
It was fabulous Briyani Rice - even better than some that we have back home. I think it was a cross between Kebab Rice and Briyani Rice. Definitely worth another visit.
We backtracked further after that - back up Walls Street, in fact. All because we were heading towards Chinatown and Little Italy, as per the instructions from the WikiAnswers.
Ultimately we look at the map and realise its just too far, so we just head to our last item on our itinerary - the Brooklyn Bridge.
The Brooklyn Bridge is not as fantastic as the Golden Gate Bridge, but its iconic its own way. From the other side, however, there's a great view of Manhattan. That's apparently one thing there is in Brooklyn - a good view of Manhattan.
By then, Pammie was really really tired from all the walking - we had walked about 8.5km by then. We wanted to get Pizza from one of the shops - Grimaldi's - but they don't sell by the slice. So we decide to go back to Little Puerto Rico and find something to eat there.
In the end we ended up eating Pizza anyway - and not by the slice. But it was $5 for a whole pepperoni pizza. How could one pass up that opportunity? We ate a few slices on a bench in Little Puerto Rico itself; dodgy to the max, by the way. And then afterwards carried and ate as we walked back to the hostel; it was getting a little too late to stay out, even in such a safe neighbourhood as Little Puerto Rico.
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